the redbook cafe

Tokyo is a very large, cosmopolitan city, and cafes are getting more and more common, but they are still not of the variety and quality that you　might expect. So finding a nice arty, independent cafe is always a pleasant surprise. And finding one in my own neighborhood was a JOY! The Redbook is a little 12 seat cafe/bar, one couch, some bar stools around the counter, and one smaller table for two. I went there today to do some thinking and catching up on my writing. The interior was all designed and decorated by the female owner. She is young, very artistic, and seems to be quite down to earth. Nice little coffee/tea/and cocktail menu. Moves easily between sunny afternoon cafe spot to cozy bar. Dark green walls, wine red highlights, and very yummy cafe mocha. The best is that she serves the coffee drinks in a bowl-cup. I love those and they are far to rare. I remember in my Philadelphia days, two cafes, the Supreme Bean, and the Last Drop Cafe both had deep wonderful bowls for cappuccinos and lattes. Nothing better than to wrap your hands around a bowl of creamy steamed milk and coffee on a cold winter day. Today at the Redbook, I Got some writing done... nice afternoon off place. And only 10 mins. from my apartment.
definately going to become a regular.

kit kat and cross blog pr

In the "interesting candy release" world of Japan... there are many foriegn brands that release for Japan only flavors. One of the metro bloggers wrote about Wine Flavored KitKat Here Haven't tried these myself yet. I will give an update if I find them somewhere. One of the other strange aspects is that even when they release and promote special flavors here they keep the mistique by making the supply small and trying to build up demand.

Special Edition/ Limited Time Only

One of the things I like about living in Japan food wise is the sense of seasons and time in what is available. Fruits are available seasonally, for example; my favorite peaches can only be found in july early august. It keeps things special and changing and new, and generally the taste is better because instead of forced hot house produce you are eating fruit when it grows naturally.

Peaches in Summer, Mikan *Tangerines in Winter, Japanese grapes in the fall with the Fuji Apples... and so it goes.

this special edition mentality often gets taken to extremes however. Young japanese shoppers will line up for hours and spend hundreds of thousands of yen for a limited edition LVMH bag. And in a less expensive but even more interesting example... there is limited edition candy. each year, almost every month, in the convienience stores there is some special limited box or bag or bar of candy. The ones shown above are from last month... already gone from the shelves. I didn't think much of the pie alamode but the cappuccino one was actually pretty yummy.

I note that this kind of marketing is expanding back into the states as well. Starbucks used to only have special edition drinks in the USA for christmas... in japan a few years ago they started having all kinds of limited drinks at the Starbucks here. But I read recently that USA starbucks is creating more special menu items too.

I Love Gingerbread latte's by the way, and the GL season went by far too quickly this year.

I wonder if the special edition candy, coffee, etc. is not a reaction to tapping into the speedy lives we all lead and our desire to slow things down, make the time special. Smell the flowers? Anyway, more on special candy as I spot them.
-ls 

Catching up on Christmas and New Year's Blogging

Being in the restaurant business means I do more serving of holiday meals than eating them. But I have to say, I really enjoy making people happy and bringing them a delicious meal when they are celebrating with family and friends. And my hubby and I do get creative about schedules and still find time to have some holiday fun ourselves.

This year he came to the restaurant at 9pm after I had seated the last reservation group, on Christmas and we shared a great Christmas dinner. Roast Beef, Yorkshire pudding and mashed potatoes. YUM. We brought in a bottle of wonderful wine to have with dinner. A Mathews Cellars reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, from Washington state. It was perfect with the dinner. A little short in the finish, but really elegant and went terrifically with the roast beef.


For New Year’s Eve- We closed the restaurant at 7pm on 12/31… So, home I went to a tasty dinner. In my family back home in the states New Year’s traditions harken back to my Mother’s side of the family who were of German Decent or as they were known in Pennsylvania- "Pennsylvania Dutch" which actually came from the name for germany in german DEUTSCHLAND, not Holland!. Our new year’s dinner this year was just like I would have had with my Grandmother when I was growing up. Pork, Sauerkraut, Mashed potatoes… we forgot to get out the apple sauce but I also brought home some bisquits. Terri came over to enjoy New Year’s eve with us, she really enjoyed the dinner, And we had snacks, watched a movie and made popcorn after.

New Year’s Day- the restaurant is closed! this is the one day of the year we are not open... Chris and I Slept in Soooo late…. Ahhh.


Then we made Belgian waffles with strawberries. Perfect, decadent breakfast, Our little toasted sandwich and waffle-maker did not disappoint. Later it was out for a late lunch, and then we went to the movies to see KING KONG! I loved the movie, and I really think Peter Jackson is a genius. So all in all, my holidays included lots of hard work, but fun and good food with my husband and friend as well.

Modest fun and delicious…

The photos did not come out well. I was in too big a hurry to eat. But the food was yummy and it made for a very nice evening with my Hubby.

We were facing our usual dilemma of trying to figure out what to have for dinner after a long day at work. For foodies, I must say, our evening fare is not all that inspiring during the week nights. But we had the idea as we stood near the crossing in Shibuya to do a “Tokyo Department Store Picnic.”

Let me explain… The first floor or often Basement floor of most department stores in Japan and also many train stations, is a food floor. Not a food court like they have in the USA/ fast food and all that… but a food floor of small booths of different kinds of prepared and unprepared / gourmet/ and down home foods. From 60$ Melons (OUTRAGEOUS) to humble rice balls to imported chocolates/ you can find it all. It is my theory that the outdoor markets of Japan moved inside because of all the rain. So it is a lot like being in a very clean, bright, chic inside version of an outdoor Asian market.

I will follow up with more food-floor posts in the near future. But for this outing we were focused on some quick take out dinner fare.

A bit of this and that, with some coins and a few bills in my pocket and we had a lovely dinner. Some of the features were a miso-basted fish / crab fried rice / steamed Chinese Shumai dumplings/ and a very yummy simple tuna rice ball (Onigiri) This was from the Tokyu Food Floor at Shibuya Station.

By the way… at this spot you can also buy from Dean and DeLuca / Starbucks / Godiva and other world wide well known shops.

Lots of fun. And the best is, if you go just before closing time at 8pm, you can get discounts on a lot of the fresh prepared foods. 

still no time .... argh

well, this end of year season has just been crazy at Fujimamas. No time to think. and I keep losing my camera charger in various black holes around my desk at work and our tokyo tiny apartment... so even when I have had some good holiday food experiences I've had no camera to capture it... very frustrating. Anyway the restaurant is doing well. Lots of company parties booked for christmas and the end of the year. good catering schedule, lots going on. So many foodbloggers are writing great holiday posts though, I am jealous.

I had a day off today, even though it was a friday. I was a bit selfish, but then I had not taken any time off for 13 days, so it was time. I was getting cranky, never a good sign.

I bought some great teas today from a gorgeous little shop. Cha No Yu in the Hiroo neighborhood of Tokyo. This was after going to the popular foriegn foods supermarket National Azabu. I got some tasty holiday treats, including cookies, egg nog and some bagels for breakfast tomorrow morning before I head back in to do the opening shift at the restaurant. I also stocked up on food magazines and wrapping paper, since they have a sort of book-store-card-shop upstairs.

Anyway, not much going on except work work work. But hopefully i will save up some good stories and get back into posting here as soon as we finish up this big holiday rush.

Oh and in other news, I will be headed over to work for a couple of weeks in Hawaii, in Fujimamas new restaurant in Kona, on the Big Island. We were already written about over on chowhound So I will have some new hawaii adventures to relate I hope.

ok, bed time.

ben and jerry's blogthing personality quiz

You Are In a Crunch Ice Cream

The perfect combo: a completely nuts person who likes to be touched

What Flavor Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream Are You?

How did you spend your Friday Night?

This weekend I had quite an experience. A team from our restaurant went to a huge convention center event to run a food booth. This was not any event though, but an annual all night RAVE called Electroglide. So that meant we would be selling food from 9pm at night till 7am in the morning.

We did this same event two years ago, along with 9 other restaurants, but this year was quite a bit different. First off, the event itself was larger. Roughl7 20,000 people attending. And then this year, instead of 10 food stands there were only 4!

we decided on a nice menu of 3 kinds of things served on rice. Vegetable Thai Curry, Beef and veggies, and Chicken Terriyaki. So far so good.

After a week of prep in the restaurant, at the same times as preparing for service for thanksgiving dinner for 300 the day before--- we loaded up our vans, and headed to the convention center spot, Makuhari Messe, about 1 hour outside of tokyo. Arrived, set up, and were feeling really good about ourselves.

Until...

we started service, our booth was instantly popular (we were also selling vanilla brownies!) and the masses started to swarm. Suddenly, two things happend.

1. We ran out of the rice we already had cooked much faster than we thought we would.
2. the large rental rice cooker we brought BROKE! and we had only one small one left!!!

so now with hundreds of people lined up in front of our booth, we had nothing but brownies and beer!!!

My boss drove all around the area and came back with noodles, and we quickly switched to noodles, while still making rice in the small cooker and selling it as quick as we could make it.

This kind of crazy frenzy went on for about 8 hours! when exhausted and having sold any food we could come up with, we finally finished the evening. We sold thousands of beers, hundreds of waters and orange juice, thousands of brownies, and then we all collapsed. My husband and two of my friends came out to work the event with us. We had a total staff of about 20 people. We definately learned a lot from this, and hopefully there will be a next time! But it was one of the craziest nights I've had in the food business... 

a japanese blog and the return of the Madeleline

the Espresso car I wrote about and photographed before... the one in the old citron, was gone from our neighborhood for a long time. Chris and I really missed it!

The young man who owns and runs it is so nice and a pretty serious coffee guy. He told us before he was going to a new spot in Daikanyama, an neighborhood not too far from here. But we were spoiled having him so close by and we never made it over to the new spot. Then suddenly today he returned. And I found out he has his own Madeleline blog over at http://madeleine2.exblog.jp/ It is in Japanese but you can get a sense of it if you use the online translator at Babel Fish!

anyway, it is great to have him back in the neighborhood- I had a chance to enjoy a cappucino tonight. It was fun to check out his blog too.

yes, I do still eat...

it has been a sad state of affairs here at the fancy glass. I realized today it has been almost a month since I have written...!

the Restaurant I work in has been busy, as have I. and though I have been eating, I must admit food adventures that would inspire me to write have been few.

The news is good though, this week will be Thanksgiving. And once again, our restaurant Fujimamas will be making sure that americans living overseas in Tokyo will not go turkey-less. We are already sold out for two seatings in our 170 seat restaurant!

So pictures of turkey and pumpkin pie are coming soon!

*Lauren

Chocolate Porn

In 2000 when I visited Spain for the first time, I was in a small cafe somewhere and had chocolate in a cup... there is no other way to describe it. It wasn't hot chocolate or cocoa... it was as if someone had melted a whole candy bar and kept it liquid and served it up. It was an amazing experience. When I went back in 2002 I searched and found this amazing drink/dessert again. And found actually that some breakfast places served it with sweet and cinnamon churros.

This explanation is from a Spanish portal site I saw recently

"Hay Churros"
If you spot a sign in Spain saying 'Hay Churros' at breakfast time go in and ask for 'Chocolate y Churros por favor'. What will arrive is the thickest cup of hot chocolate you have ever seen with a plate of deep fried 'fritters'. You eat this by dipping the churros in the chocolate (this is perhaps not for weight watchers).

you can find a recipe here

So when we went to Barcelona last week I was eager to show my friend Terri this dream in a cup. After visiting the Sagrada Familia, the cathedral built by Gaudi, we meandered up the lovely old streets. We found a pastry shop with streetside tables and ordered a cup to share. Terri immediately dubbed the cup full of hot pudding like chocolate "Chocolate Porn" which is a pretty apt name... It really does spoil you for regular old hot cocoa.... The Cup we had was from a menu of different types. I chose the merangue one which had little dollops of crystalized eggwhites and sugar sprinkled on top. I definately do not want to wait years again to have this treat. So I will be trying the recipe at home, now that I have found one!

Here's to Chocolate Porn!

Traditional Fish Stew in Copenhagen

My Husband and a friend and I just returned from a short trip to Barcelona Spain for a political conference. Due to some crazy travel agent named Shazad (don't ask) we had to get to Spain via a one night stay over in Denmark. We got in to the very nice Copenhagen airport in the afternoon and then checked into the Hilton connected to the terminal. It is quite easy to get a train from the airport to downtown Copenhagen and so we decided to go in search of food adventures. It was a bit brisk and windy, but the city was lovely at dusk. We walked past the famous Tivoli gardens/park, currently closed until closer to Christmas... And then down through a main tourist and shopping area. Getting jet laggy, a bit cold and quite hungry We made our way to famous Nyhavn Street (pronounced New Hown), with it's canal to the sea. Found a cozy little place with friendly if a bit odd staff. And I had some fantastic fish stew. Served with cheese, crispy bread slices, and a spicy mustard sauce. We had main dishes after- but this stew is what I will really remember. Kind of a mix of flavors like a creamy bouillabaisse. Very warming on a chilly Denmark night.

Another Blog thing quiz... what kind of candy are you?

this is mine, click the link at the bottom and find out yours.
*Lauren

Snickers

Nutty and gooey - you always satisfy.

What Kind of Candy Are You?

Local Roasting

There is a wonderful tiny coffee bean shop near the train station where I live in nakameguro. They have terrific beans, lots of choices and they roast them for you while you wait.

The best part is it is by no means some big commercial affair. It is a small older Japanese couple. On our last visit the Man who runs the place told us that he has been in this business all his life as his father was a coffee trader too. The wife was so funny, when we asked what kind of coffee she liked- she said Oh- I am not the coffee person it is all him, and so we said "well, what do you like to drink?" She answered quite promptly "BEER!"

when asked "What Kind?" The answer came back just as fast... "All Kinds!"

So the fella, roasted us some fine beans. He roasts and prepares the beans based on what kind of coffee making devise you are using. In our case, we are a bit old fashioned. Chris makes espresso in a little stove top brewer like This one!

So we got a nice dark roast and they poured some lovely coffee for us to try while the roasting was going on. Very nice folks. We will definitely go back there!
They even sell fair trade coffee.

Sleepy update on our DINE FOR AMERICA event

Well, I wanted to post before bed to say that thanks to our guests, and thanks to the owners of the restaurant where I am director- that agreed and supported the idea. Fujimamas was successful in our efforts to host a Dine For America event, and raised about 800.00 dollars USA to send to hurricane Katrina and Rita survivors, struggling to put their lives back together in the aftermath.

Being in Japan, and with the dateline and all those time zones, we were one of the first restaurants to hold our event. Some 17,000 restaurants are signed up all across the USA and in various countries around the world. You still have time to go out and make a reservation at a local restaurant check for your favorites at Dine For America

thanks to everyone who came out to eat at fujimamas tonight, and all the encouragement. If you did not get a chance to go to an event you can still support the effort by donating directly to the Dine For America campaign page

sign in changes

Dear Fancy Glass friends. The fancy glass has been being accosted by spambots and other automated blog ads in the comment threads. So I have changed the settings. You will need to log in and also do the little verify thing... Sorry for the extra steps. Hope you will still post.
thanks,
Lauren

What kind of food are you?

Took this little food quiz today, easy and fun!

You Are Thai Food

Trendy yet complex. People seek you out - though they're not sure why.

Take the quiz yourself, here- What Kind of Food Are You?

Fancy Glass RR- goes okinawan

Fancy Glass RR Restaurant Review for ICHARIBO-

The other night, looking for something new, My husband and I decided to try a cute Okinawan specialty restaurant in the neighborhood. We went on the early side, since it was sat. and I was tired and hungry after working a brunch service in my restaurant. We have been meaning to go there because for a bout a year they had a sign outside proudly declaring "We have English Menu!"

As luck would have it, they DID have an English menu, before they wrote this new menu, which they have not translated. But no worries, we could read most of the hiragana and katakana and there were lots of pictures in the menu. We sat on the first floor at a long bar-like counter. Actually we realized quickly that this place is also famous for Okinawan Alcohol and the bar layout is because it is probably a bit more like a bar than a table service restaurant. I have not checked out the second floor yet, maybe it is a more restaurant feeling up there.

The Place was beautiful. A little dark in the décor but very city-esque. There were lots of red ceramic dragons, typical of design from Okinawa and across asia.
The dishes were all served on gorgeous pottery. And the service was friendly. At least the first girl. Later in our meal, a rather snooty bartender came on duty and he did not add anything to the experience.

We started with a paper-thin, pastry-like- crepe sort of quesadilla thing… Quite thin, pretty and would have been good, except that it was laden with eggplant. The funny thing about eggplant is that I like it pickled which is one way it is served in Japan, but I don’t really like any other way…. Cooked, baked, broiled, grilled all not to my liking. This was alright though. Of course I wouldn’t order it again but Chris enjoyed it, so that was nice for him.

We next had a Karage Chicken dish, which is kind of a marinated and fried chicken. It was served with leafy lettuce and fresh tomatoes. Very tasty.
We had a fantastic Sushi roll. With cucumber, okinawan fish, avocado… an inside out roll with tobiko (roe) on the outside. This was one of my favorite parts of the meal.

We were drinking some terrific icy cold sake, and I had a spicy dry gingerale as well.

We also enjoyed a wonderful rice/soup dish--- which I forgot to photograph. And Finally ended up with the highlight of the night. Tempura Banana with cinnamon and ice cream. It was delicious.

The only downside of the evening is that the restaurant was very bar like, and as we were sitting at the counter, and this is Japan where all bars are still very much smoking environments… we were subjected to WAY TOO MUCH smoke. It is what finally drove us away. I would have loved to stay and try some of the other drinks from Okinawa, but the smoke was really burning my eyes…

FANCY GLASS RR on a scale of 1-5 (one being low)

Atmosphere 3 – stylish and very nice though a bit dark.

Food- 4.5 excellent I really wanted to try more things, but got too full.

Service- 2 - really so-so, we were being waited on by two bartenders, and it felt really impersonal. Not really fun. The woman bartender was a bit better but the guy was kind of a jerk.

Dessert 5- I LOVE banana tempura. I used to make it at home, even when we lived back in philly years ago. This restaurant served their’s with chocolate. I preferred to prepare mine with honey drizzeled on top. But this was a great dessert.

Would I go back? I think so, but there are other places I want to explore in our neighborhood first. The smoke was a real detraction actually.

"Never doubt that small groups of thoughtful, commited citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead

OCTOBER 5th 2005- the above image is from the same organization different date.
Well, I have been away from my food blog for far too long... first was out having fun, gathering content, and trying out new restaurants. then- Katrina hit the gulf coast in the USA. The thing is, I had a hard time seeing how writing about food was not a bit decadent at a time when so many americans were suffering. Even though I am living overseas I am quite active in ngo, npo and political work. After katrina, I started a new project SENDING SMILES We also had a fundraiser/ concert for Katrina Survivors. And so I have not been over here to the fancy glass much at all.

I am happy to report, however, That the restaurant I work with Fujimamas is participating in a great food industry related fundraiser Dine For America! On Oct. 5th we are joining hundreds of Restaurants who are donating some or all of their profits for the day to Katria Relief efforts. I think this is a great effort to give to communities that are suffering. Especially in the new orleans area where so many people were employed in the food and beverage industry before this terrible tragedy struck.

You can go to this page, and see if there are restaurants in your area, and please tell your favorite restaurant about this program and tell them that you would be proud to help get the word out if they chose to participate. as of this post there are almost 7,000 restaurants signed up to participate! and growing.

As a member of the food loving community I hope you will try to make sure to get out and support this effort on 10/5. I will let you all know how our event worked out.

CLICK below to listen to my Test Post Audioblogging!